


Choose my Weapon and Choose my Way

by breatheforeverypart



Series: Maxim(ize) the Trauma [1]
Category: Black Widow (Movie 2020), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Blood and Gore, F/M, Gen, I'll update the tags as I go, Injury Recovery, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Wanda Maximoff Needs a Hug, searching for a mentor, similar red room experiences
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-12 20:55:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,155
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29266860
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/breatheforeverypart/pseuds/breatheforeverypart
Summary: “She’s a weapon of mass destruction.”Da.  Yes.  She belonged in the most secure prison.  She belonged to the people she had failed.  To those who had died.  Anguish bubbled through her pores, her damned powers bathed Wanda in a scarlet glow.Concrete cracked under her fingertips.  The evil of the facility would be purged.  The ground on which it was built was haunted.  Pietro had spilled blood here.  So, had she.  Any hope of a future had been obliterated here.
Series: Maxim(ize) the Trauma [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2149299
Comments: 6
Kudos: 27





	1. W.M.D. - Wanda's Mass Destruction

***

Natasha’s hand shook as she wiped her nose. The back of her hand was smeared with a mixture of blood and snot. Her head ached and pounded. She had to try. Wanda screamed and Natasha recoiled at the sound. 

Her latest attempt to reach the Little Witch had failed and resulted in a broken nose. The Red Room’s off-brand serum meant that she would heal with barely a scratch, but Natasha wasn’t immune to the throbbing pain. 

She coughed, her ribs protesting the expansion of her lungs. “I know you’re exhausted, but please stay with me. Wanda, you can control it.” Her voice cracked. Natasha forced herself to stand. Blurry stars dotted her vision, making forward movement challenging. 

She cursed and the words were absorbed into the vortex that Wanda had created. She raged, the red tendrils of magic lashing out at the structure that teetered around them. Natasha was reminded of the stacking game that Lila liked to play. Removing one rectangle could cause the tower to tumble, which sounded a lot more fun in miniature…the present version could be fatal. 

The last year of Wanda’s life had been spent exhuming scars. Her wounds had drawn Natasha and James through their own battlefields. Eroded memories that Nat had thought dead and buried, rose like zombies in the movies that Clint loved to hate. 

“Maximoff! This isn’t how you wanted it to end.” Natasha swallowed a mouthful of dust and regret. The plan had gone sideways immediately. Hell, the plane barely made a safe landing in Bulgaria. Natasha had felt safer flying with Tony’s suits than she did with that ‘certified’ pilot. 

Honestly, Natasha regretted going M.I.A. with one of the youngest Avengers-in-training. But, there were no other options. She had to protect James. He remained unconscious, his serum keeping him in state of suspended animation…one that did not show any progress or deterioration. 

Steve’s rage shamed her. His meltdown on the medical floor had been seared into her brain like a tumor. The more she ruminated on the events, the more complex roots the cancer developed. 

Rogers had been enraged. “You’ve killed him. Why couldn’t you let it go? Move on. Live the life you’ve been gifted.” He blocked her entry to James’ suite and raised his voice. 

Clint had to be kept safe. Laura and the girls needed to be kept out of their grasp. What had she learned? Almost nothing. On the surface, the Red Room appeared to have disappeared. The base Wanda had destroyed had been hiding in plain sight. The people who had tortured the Maximoff’s and children like Yelena were scattered across the world. Dead or alive, it didn’t matter. If Natasha managed to extract herself and Wanda from this situation, the hunt would begin for the notorious handlers. 

Natasha grunted as she tripped over a corpse. H.Y.D.R.A. agents. S.H.I.E.L.D. employees. Allegiances changed as frequently as the weather. Natasha saw herself as proof of how loyalties could change. 

Wanda screamed, bringing Nat back to the dire present. What had they done to her? She had miscalculated on the Siberia operation. James had nearly died because of her impulsivity. 

Now, the book was destroyed. If any good had come of that shit-show, it had been ensured no one could summon the Winter Soldier again.

His blood melting the snow haunted her nightly. Wilson sent updates on Barnes’ condition, but she could not make herself respond. She would not endanger his life with Rogers again. He deserved redemption and she would not interfere. 

The Little Witch’s anger was righteous. Natasha watched Wanda as her powers faltered. She panted, debris plummeting around her like ripe apples from a tree. 

Exhaustion could be more dangerous than enraged passion. “Wanda.” Natasha choked on thick smoke. Appearances could be deceiving, Wanda had trained under the same umbrella of tyrannical structure. They knew how to twist reality and bend targets into submission. 

Gusts of hurricane force winds tossed chunks of concrete around like dust bunnies. “No! This is my choice.” Her accent, which she had tried so hard to bury cracked through the syllables. 

She crawled toward the young woman. The floor was littered with bodies. S.H.I.E.L.D., H.Y.D.R.A. their ‘duty’ didn’t justify the methods. They were all wrong for trying to control the Little Witch. 

She tightened her grip on the telescoping baton and edged closer to the young woman barely holding her powers in check. “Please, Wanda. Listen. Just listen.” No leashes of scarlet lunged for her, so Natasha kept speaking. 

Natasha accepted that she couldn’t see, hear or feel most of her body. The roar of Wanda’s pain annihilated all of her senses. But, she would not give up on her Little Witch. 

Natasha knew how to survive. She would process the deaths of the prisoners held at the base. She could accept responsibility for hurting her brother and found family. She’d walked back to base on a broken femur and several fractured vertebrae. That pain couldn’t compare with the turmoil of the last year. She could bargain away her guilt if they survived this ordeal. 

“This mission is over.” Nat swallowed an impulse to coat her lie in comfort. It wasn’t over. If they survived, the destruction of this previously unknown HYDRA base would lead down a rabbit hole of chaos. 

“He’s gone. He won’t hurt anyone else. But, Wanda you know we need help to take out the rest.” If they were lucky, Ant-Man would volunteer just for street-cred. He might be their only ally in the upcoming battle. 

Natasha had buried similar rage for decades. She feared that she would lose control and destroy the world. But, she was not going to lose Maximoff. 

The Red Room had taken all of her sestras. All of them, dead and used as literal and metaphorical plant food for Madam’s roses. Just after her graduation from the academy, Natasha had learned that for every failed student, their teacher planted a bush. Her thriving garden had been rooted in death. 

Wanda hugged herself. “I can’t let anyone else die. Don’t you wish for death? I’d rather die than be what they made us.” The warm glow leeched from her body, her eyes the only part of her body that still shone. 

“This isn’t your fault. I should have helped you. I promise, you have a home a New York. You have family with me.” Natasha recoiled from a body as she continued to crawl towards the young woman. 

Time is not on her side. The building burned and crumbled around them. There would be no survivors, not even bones for their team to recover. 

“He’s dead because of me.” She clutched her head, fingers scratching her scalp. Threads of Wanda’s power enclosed both women. “They deserve…punishment. As do, I. He was innocent. I hurt him. My fault, sestra.” Memories blended. Pietro. Soldat. She had murdered many, but their deaths mattered more. They had succeeded in destroying her. 

“He’s not.” Natasha caught the sleeve of Wanda’s jacket. “Please, listen to me.” That discussion would have to wait. He appeared lifeless. The glimpse of his pale body that she’d caught on Nat’s video chat with Sam had terrified her. She had warped the truth to blame herself, again. 

“Wanda, let me show you. Sam and Rogers are with him. He’s not…awake. But his heart is beating. That’s something. Laura and the kids are safe and hiding with Barton. I promise.” She fumbled with one of the slim pockets of her reinforced suit. If her phone had survived her fall from the third story, she owed Stark a week’s worth of shawarma from the best kept secret in Queens dining. 

Wanda hyperventilated. Sparks of her power fell harmlessly on Natasha. If she really wanted to do harm, Wanda could. She was acting out of fear. 

It would be effortless. Like Natasha, she could kill a dozen ways with no need for a tangible weapon other than her own body. The fact that she was still breathing, meant there was chance to save both their lives. 

The air tasted metallic and the hair on the back of Natasha’s neck prickled with fear. There was no time for more negotiations. Perhaps, she could pull off something that only Clint had managed to do. 

Save a life that no one else thought could be redeemed. One that most people would write off as better, dead. 

Natasha inhaled the ashy air and channeled Clint. “Maximoff, let’s dial down the intensity and talk.” As she parroted her partner’s words, she knew that passing out was within the realm of possibility. 

Had she really yielded to these ridiculous words? Why had she let Clint take her in to S.H.I.E.L.D.? 

Would Wanda choose to take a chance? At life? By the sound of it, the entire building would crush them the moment her powers ceased to prop up the structure. 

Black spots burst across her vision. Fresh oxygen would be good. But she’d settle for air that wasn’t grey and heavy with smog. Dying outside would be preferable. 

“Nat?” She asked. Wanda rubbed her arms. Her attempts to quiet the voices that snapped at her failed. 

Her frustration warped the beams that barely held the structure upright. 

The building groaned as if, responding to Wanda’s emotions. Metal twisted and sparked under her turbulent thoughts. The fire that had consumed the dormitories approached the training center they occupied. 

Before Natasha could choose another strategy, Wanda grasped her forearm. 

Despite the heated light of her digits, the pinky finger that contacted Natasha chilled her to the bone. All it took, was one centimeter of skin to establish the connection. 

With a groan, consciousness left Natasha with concrete for a pillow. Wanda’s spine straightened, forcing air into her screaming lungs. 

Shared experiences surged between the women. 

Children bonded by torture. 

Many tears shed over traumas they could not control. 

Calloused and calculated decisions made in order to survive. Could one call those, choices at all? 

The merry-go-round of memories stopped without warning. Wanda found herself drowning in grief so dense it crushed her ribs. Suddenly, her powers extinguished like a candle deprived of oxygen. The building collapsed like a tower of wooden blocks. Darkness descended like a blessing and Wanda gave in to the nothingness. 

***

Wanda existed outside her body. Versions of herself trying to exist along the same plane of reality made her feel like every cell could implode. Pain surged through every nerve and only strengthened the storm of her power moving along every synapsed neuron. 

“She’s a weapon of mass destruction.” 

Da. Yes. She belonged in the most secure prison. She belonged to the people she had failed. To those who had died. Anguish bubbled through her pores, her damned powers bathed Wanda in a scarlet glow. 

Concrete cracked under her fingertips. The evil of the facility would be purged. The ground on which it was built was haunted. Pietro had spilled blood here. So, had she. Any hope of a future had been obliterated here. 

The tremors that followed these thoughts, paused her rage fueled hurricane. 

“Twins. From Sokovia.” 

Pietro. The handlers had substituted torture for meals and human contact. They broke the Maximoff’s bones and brains in the name of perverted science. The mold they had was for an invention that went against nature. 

A renewed wave of grief brought Wanda to her knees. 

His body haunted her. The crooked smile he flashed dropped as he noted the holes in his torso. Bullets from an automatic weapon shredded his abdomen. He spoke to her, taunting her in the annoyingly comforting way, that only a sibling could. 

“No. I’m not going to leave you.” 

Lie! Everyone lied. Everyone died. Why couldn’t she die? 

“Wanda. Wanda, if you stay here, you’ll die.” 

The mellifluously artificial voice prickled Wanda’s consciousness. Something was wrong. This had already happened. Time was wrong and lying to her. 

“Be strong sestra.” 

Pietro had mistaken her rage for bravery. She is weak. She had been born first and was cursed to survive something that should have killed the last of the Maximoff line. Her twin had died trying to save their country. She should have perished with him. That would have been honorable. 

The very proof of her failure is Pietro’s death. Her brother’s corpse called to her. “Brother.” Wanda reached for him. Her skin faded to an unhealthy pallor. 

Wrong. He did not have red hair. Then, who lay next to her? Imposter. This was not her brother. 

The stranger is bloodied, but not dead. Yet. The woman could be the focus of her rage. But something does not fit. Like a jigsaw puzzle with an extra piece. Part of Wanda knows the infamous Black Widow. But, how? 

Hydra removed the last dregs of her humanity. She juggled hunks of debris. Wanda knows that she deserves punishment. That is all she knows. 

Why then, does her hesitation allow this woman to keep breathing? 

Wrong. Wanda’s heartbeat accelerated, panic blurring her vision.  
The world slipped out of sync. There is no one left in her life to protect. The Maximoff girl is no longer human. She is an object, a weapon built for destruction. Just aim and shoot. 

“Little Witch…” 

The Americans chose that nickname. It had not been selected out of fear, expectations or hatred. Instead, there was humor and affection that behind the name. 

Delusional. Stupid, stupid, stupid whore. Wanda struggled to breath. 

“Wanda.” The surviving sestra spoke. Natalia. How could she be alive after her tantrum? 

Wanda could destroy cities and turn thousands of citizens to dust. Why was Nat stubbornly trying to save her life? “Natalia?” She rasped, squinting at the bright blue sky. 

“Da…I think.” Sun, actual sunlight illuminated the older woman’s face. It was bloodied, smeared with dirt and swollen with bruises, but Wanda prayed it was real. 

Not real. No. If this was real, then everything…all of the sins she had committed had actually occurred. 

Pietro laughed in a cruel, high voice that mirrored the Maximoff twin’s tormentors. He taunted her. Did family mean blood? Which relationships equaled trust? Uncertainty chased every question that popped into her mind. 

“Wanda, hold on.” Natasha loomed over her, blocking out the sun. 

Nyet. That was directive she could ignore? Nat said she could choose. She did not lie. Pinky promise. A silly gesture, but one that Lila loved to initiate. 

Natasha cursed, tugging off her jacket and shoving it against the wound. “Fuck. You can’t…” Pressure chased pain that dredged guttural noises from the prehistoric part of her brain. “Eyes open, Maximoff!” 

An order. Wanda’s eyes snapped open. Their programming had created tracks so automatic, there was no conscious decision to resist her reaction. She groaned, unable to wriggle away from Natasha. 

“Good. You can hate me later.” Natasha grabbed both her hands and smashed them into the hole in her abdomen. 

Wanda gasped. “Pietro…stay with m-me.” 

Natasha surrendered to a fraction of the fear that threatened her ability to staunch the bleeding. She allowed herself one sob and moment of doubt. 

Then, she functionally dissociated. Auto-pilot was her oldest ally. Her therapist would be disappointed, but Natasha might welcome the criticism if she survived. 

She dialed someone who owed her dozens of favors. The adrenaline that had fueled her escape from the rubble with Maximoff on her back left as quickly as it had arrived. “Hold on, Maximoff. Just stay with me.” 

Guilt filled the space in her chest that had been swelled with adrenaline only moments ago. The call Natasha had made for reinforcements had shattered all of her promises to Wanda. Another way that she had failed a sestra. The ghost of Yelena grinned at her. Hallucinations were never a good sign, but Natasha welcomed the specter of her sestra. 

The ground swayed. Natasha blinked, but the vertigo only intensified. Ringing in her ears drowned out everything except the pounding of her heart. 

Wanda’s blood continued to leak from between her fingers. She tried to hold the unconscious women’s hands together, to keep pressure. Yelena called her name as awareness dimmed into unconsciousness. 

***


	2. Armor of an Avenging Sort

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> ***
> 
> Pietro laughed from the confines of her skull. Wanda bit her lip to make him recede. Now was not the time for guilt to cloud her judgement. 
> 
> Her stomach contracted, grumbling as the smell of Happy’s fast food permeated the car. To regain he focus, Wanda counted the turns before the car lurched into park. 
> 
> “Welcome, Miss Maximoff.” A series of locks clicked and the belt that had tethered her to the upholstery released. 
> 
> ***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welcome back! I'll be updating every Saturday or Sunday, depending on how much editing I get through during the week. Thank you for your feedback, I am so happy and grateful for all of your kudos and comments.

***

“Rewind, rewind.” Sang the cast to a musical named after a founding father. Wanda mouthed the words in faultless time to the song. Comprehension of the words had taken four repetitions of the album. 

A strange mixture of fear and boredom vibrated through her skeleton. There were no windows for her to gaze out. The backseat of the vehicle kept her completely isolated from the outside world. Her captors seriously overreacted to her feeble attempt at controlling the security staff. 

Those antics had led to her current state of sensory deprivation. A pack of agents flanked her to the vehicle that navigated her towards the next prison. She’d been bound with a hood over her head and ear muffs tugged over the sweatshirt emblazoned with the agency’s logo. 

They slowed for a pedestrian, traffic light, tusked elephant or giant bull-dozer for all she knew. S.H.I.E.L.D. took anonymity more seriously than the organization that had tortured her and her brother. 

Time meant little to Wanda, especially after her processing at the facility. A man with pirate patch over one eye appeared to be in charge. His subordinate, a slim man who smiled too much. Maybe his name was Coulson? 

He skimmed files on a slim tablet before transferring her to a chubby man with glasses in a charcoal suit. Whatever authority he had, made the other agents’ part like the Red Sea. His name was also an emotion in English. Happy. Ridiculous moniker, Wanda smirked to herself. 

And so, Wanda found herself bound at the wrists, ankles and waist. She swayed with the motion of the car. 

Now, Wanda understood most of the lyrics, in English. She hummed along to the melody, drumming in her mind. Actual drumming was impossible at the moment. The restraints prevented any volitional movement. 

“Almost there, Miss Maximoff. We got one more stop to make. Miss Potts needs a bribe for the boss-man.” 

“No. I’m not authorized to take detours.” 

“But…for Mr. Stark, there’s wiggle room, right?” 

A woman’s voice answered. The driver? Wanda hated that she was becoming more curious, but boredom meant she was interested in the mundane. “Beyond my paygrade.” 

“There’s a cheeseburger in it for you.” Happy promised. 

“Made it a combo meal.” 

“Deal.” 

The America she had been exposed to consisted entirely of the inside of armored vans and a long inefficient vehicle that a man called Happy identified as a ‘limousine’. 

How seriously can she take a man who is named after a fleeting feeling? Very, as it turns out. He had winked at her and stuck out his hand before blushing at his own blunder. 

For the duration of the ride, he gushed about Broadway, cuisine in the theater district and Stark Tower. Evidently, Wanda had been released with the understanding that she would be under something called ‘house arrest’. 

This made no sense, because the Tower had the inventor’s name inscribed down the side of the building like a fancy tiered cake. His living arrangements made royal residences look impoverished. 

Pietro laughed from the confines of her skull. Wanda bit her lip to make him recede. Now was not the time for guilt to cloud her judgement. 

Her stomach contracted, grumbling as the smell of Happy’s fast food permeated the car. To regain he focus, Wanda counted the turns before the car lurched into park. 

“Welcome, Miss Maximoff.” A series of locks clicked and the belt that had tethered her to the upholstery released. 

“Pleasure doing business with you, Morse.” 

“Don’t. Seriously, I have a reputation to maintain.” The agent swung the keys around her index finger. “But, thanks for the burger.” Bobbi saluted Happy and slammed the driver’s side door. The click of the lock could be heard, before she merged with traffic and disappeared into the city’s gridlock. 

“Okay-dokey. Let’s get you up to the lab.” Happy rubbed his palms together and smiled. His mouth twisted into a sinister Cheshire-cat grin. 

Mr. Hogan entered a code that released the carabiner. With one click, Wanda could take back…freedom? What would that look like? Nothing that she remembered. 

Even when her family had been alive, they were not free. The poverty of their country shackled them to generational destitution. Now, Wanda was free of that cycle. Only to be bound to a new kind of hell. One where she found herself waking from nightmares, without relief. 

“Tony can be a bit lacking in the social skills department.” Happy bent two fingers on each hand as he shuffled her down an ally. “Everything is a game to that man…” Mr. Hogan sighed. “He loves nothing more than to twist my panties in a bunch.” 

Jealousy gripped Wanda’s throat. The man guiding her into the shiny prison had problems the size of a mustard seed. She had been labeled a terrorist and potential weapon of mass destruction. 

“We’re bypassing security for obvious reasons.” Happy whispered, steering her towards the elevator. 

“He’s going to want to dissect all this S.H.I.E.L.D. tech. It’ll keep his busy over the weekend.” The hope that had settled in her gut disintegrated. The emptiness of understanding her fate as Tony Stark’s newest toy left her suspended just above her body. 

Why did she let herself believe that America would be different? Stupid girl. She deserved punishment. 

Of course, she had been traded to another sadist. Wanda existed to bear witness to unimaginable horrors. She had stopped telling people the truth. People believed a million lies a day, but barely anyone believed the truth behind her bruises and armored facade. 

***

“You’re like a gender fluid Hermione and Draco combo.” Tony frowned and clasped his hands together behind his back. He bent to study the surviving Maximoff twin. 

Wanda knelt at what she judged to be respectful distance from the millionaire. No one she had encountered in America waited for anything, especially for her to respond. Everyone talked over one another. Their mouths never stopped forming words and their ears were tightly plugged with cotton. It made observation incredibly easy. She stayed silent and people spilled their secrets without provocation. 

“Yo.” Tony removed his sunglasses to glare at Happy. “I’m not a knight of the vibranium round-table here.” 

“Come on, shake the cobwebs off your manners.” The chauffer, turned head of security retorted. “She’s had a hell of a week.”

Wanda furrowed her brow. Time had lost what little value she’d put in it as a child. Being lost in play with Pietro seemed like an impossible dream. Moments slipped through her porous brain like water through a colander. 

Tony gasped dramatically. “Excuse me, I’ve survived aliens and that whole mess in the Middle East.” 

Happy opened his mouth to argue, but was proactively shushed by Tony’s middle finger. 

He turned his attention to the young woman. “Miss Maximoff, how about some coco and a grilled cheese? There’s very little that can’t be made a little better by dairy.” Happy cracked each knuckle, then the vertebrae on either side of his neck. 

“Make it two, Hap.” 

“What did Pepper say about ordering people around?” 

“…that it’s my job?”

High heels clicked on the tiled floor. Wanda flinched. Her new handler had kinky requests. This should not have surprised Wanda, the time after her parent’s death and the destruction of their apartment complex had been filled with desperation. She forced herself to breath, she had endured sadistic men before. She could not seem to die. The newest complication in her life would not break her. Wanda perceived herself to be cursed with survival. 

The man who murdered her family with munitions of her own creation laughed as she opened her eyes. “Ah, Pepper. What did I forget?” 

The blonde woman who exuded confidence hugged a blanket scarf around her shoulders. “To tell me about our newest guest…Miss?” 

“Maximoff, this is Wanda. She’s badass and brooding, like our part-cyborg orphan and the rest of the team. Come on, you know me better than that. It’s impossible for me to plan ahead.” Tony pocketed his trademark sunglasses. 

“That’s a no-no word.” Miss Potts wagged a finger at him. 

“Oh.” Tony quirked an eyebrow, a smirk making his cheeks dimple. “We have a naughty word list now? Is there a swear jar?” 

“No. But if I let Banner make one for the Common Room…we’d make millions for charity.” Pepper swiveled on a stiletto. “Now, how can we help you get acclimated?” Her blond ponytail splayed itself over her shoulder, curled like a cat’s tail. She cradled a tablet, flicking through a variety of apps and files. 

“Welcome to the Fun-est place in the city. Wait until Rogers hears. Newest orphan to add to the collection. I’m like a damned fairytale for charity cases.” Tony rolled a cart of tools over to the child-like stray. 

“Tony!” Happy and Pepper hollered. 

“A little respect. Come on, dude.” Happy stared into the industrial refrigerator. “I don’t think specimens a through j are going to make good sandwiches.” The neatly labeled experiments were not fit for human consumption. 

Stark dropped to the floor, his legs folded in crisscross applesauce. “Listen, I’m not the villain here. Fury’s responsible for this shit.” He scoffed at their technology and undoes the shackles without another complicated thought. “Jarvis, remind me to start a not friendly game of phone tag with the master-spy, will you?” The AI assented, adding yet another item to the inventor’s to-do list. 

“Tony…” Pepper warned. 

“Oh, come on, Pep. You like a good PR war.” 

She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Happy, could I have an extra-large serving of your special coco?” 

“It’ll be my honor, Miss Potts.” Happy winked. “Have you finished Derry Girls yet?” 

Pepper squeaked. “Yes!” She launched into a summary of the latest episode. 

“Hey!” Tony whined. “Wait, why does she get all the attention?” 

“Because her manners are more developed than that of a small child. And she listens like a human.” 

“Excuse me. It’s taken years to mature my middle-school sense of humor.” 

“Ah, like aged cheese. That’s something to be proud of, Tony.” Pepper grinned weakly. “Yeah…maybe that’s the wrong word. Anyway, it’s nice to meet you Wanda. I hope you find a home here. We’ll talk tomorrow about getting you access to everything you need.” 

The click-clack of Miss Potts’ shiny heels signaled her and Happy’s retreat to another floor. 

“…and now for your ankles.” Tony glanced at the young woman. “Try and flex your joints, okay? Maria is sneaky as a fox…but these were way too tight even for private kinky stuff.” Sarcasm underlined his commentary, but the man handled her legs with unexpected kindness. 

He drew a triumphant breath as he broke the lock on the electrified bands. “There.” The ties that bound her ankles rattled against the floor. 

The sound startles her into action. Her captor and savior committed a grave error in judgement. 

Equipment snapped and groaned under her magic. Screams from her torturers mingle with Stark’s creative expletives. 

The lab’s beakers explode as she clenched and relaxed her fists. 

“Maximoff, come on!” Fury and fear pin Tony to the wall. Ropes of red threatened to squeeze his trachea shut. 

He choked. The sound of his sputtering throws Wanda headfirst into a ravine of memories. Her father’s dying breaths surround her like an expensive audio system. 

“Dark magic…little witch.” Tony gasped, massaging his throat. “Let’s get to know each other first, before…” He coughed and let his head drop to his chest. “Ouch.” 

***

After she added attempted murder of Iron Man to her list of war crimes, Wanda found herself housed in a place that smelled like Pietro’s room when they were teenagers. 

The odor is so powerful that she finds it hard to focus on anything but the loss of her twin. Her emotions are dampened by chemicals. 

Several cycles of panic chased by medicated peace pass before Wanda realized that she is bound to a bed. 

Restraints; chemical and physical tether her to yet another prison. 

People talk at her. 

But Wanda faked ignorance. By closing her eyes, she can exist in her mind. Her brain is a familiar enemy, while Stark’s property remained an untested minefield. 

More drugs flowed through her system, sedating and waking her in a pattern she did not possess enough energy to understand. 

Numbness equaled safety. Emotions meant more intense pain. 

“I know you understand us.” The red-haired woman stared her up and down, her gaze unyielding. 

Wanda felt like she was being x-rayed by her bright hazel eyes. “But I appreciate your discipline. We thought you might like something…familiar.” The formidable Widow, turned spy flicked her braid over her shoulder. 

Memory sucks all the air from her lungs. 

The man holding a bowl of pierogi encompassed the literal definition of deadly force. His face had been immortalized in strips of black and white film. She had been forced to study the executions that he planned with deft professionalism. The Black Widow’s childish face is composed of blurred pixels, but her swaggering gait is immediately recognizable. 

Steam from the dish brought a rosy color to his cheeks. Minutes slogged by in a Wonderland adjacent non-linear time stream. Wanda’s brain whirred as she tried to reconcile memory with apparent reality. 

Parcels of mashed potatoes with onion and cheese did not jive with her understanding of her current predicament. But she listened. Their words washed over her like a needling rain. At first, the contact burned, but then she grew anesthetized to their exchange. 

“Little witch.” Natasha patted the foot of the bed. “May I?” 

Wanda blinked at the woman armed with a threatening confidence. She broke the surface of the drugs and nodded with sluggish speed. 

Soldat stayed by the door, hugging the bowl of pierogi to his chest. He nibbled around the edge of the European dumpling while Natasha murmured to the young woman. 

They did not hurt her. In fact, Wanda drifted back to sleep as the former Black Widow gently untangled her hair. The conversation between two of the most dangerous people on the planet barely permeated her consciousness. 

When she inevitably startled awake, alarm flooding her system, Natasha soothed her concern. “Rest. We are here.” 

Wanda felt herself grant permission. One of the last thoughts that registered caught her by surprise. The language they spoke, came from her original home. The litany of crimes Wanda had been accused of, faded into the background as Natasha hummed a familiar lullaby. 

Heartache dulled by medication let her seek the older woman’s comforting touch. The gentle scratching of her scalp lulled her into a fragile peace. Her mother used to soothe her with the promise of tomorrow bringing new solutions to old problems. 

Perhaps, Tony would let her make amends for her destruction of the lab. Her head swirled with humiliation, muffled panic and a bizarre sense of contentment. 

Her sinful soul deserved the company of two fellow murderous employees of H.Y.D.R.A. The red that dripped from their combined ledgers, could flood Stark’s obscenely phallic shaped tower. 

Like sought like, after all. 

***


	3. Acceptable Losses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The current of Nat’s nightmares towed her under the surface of the Black Widow’s mind. Trapped and paralyzed by powers beyond her control. She struggled against the onslaught of confounding stimuli that Nat’s mind flung at her. 
> 
> Wanda could not prevent herself from blurring with decades of trauma that the notorious Natalia Romanoff had experienced. Cries that Wanda could not identify threatened to burst from the confines of her skull. Unconsciousness would be a relief, but when had Maximoff ever been granted a reprieve?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lots of angst, little comfort in this chapter friends. Wanda is very interesting to write, because anger is challenging for me to understand. 
> 
> Stay warm if you're in the cold weather that's been haunting the states. <3

***

Natasha yawned as she asked the question. “What’s going on in that brain of yours?” 

“Nothing.” Wanda swallowed the fear of giving the older woman an incorrect response. 

“Liar.” Natasha held her fists tightly under her chin. “Liar, liar, plants for hire.” She sang off-key at a higher register than her normal voice. Nat mimicked the way Jemma had quoted the Americanized phrase. 

The poor girl had flushed with embarrassment and bolted to her room following the incident. To Wanda’s knowledge she had politely refused dessert and spent the night re-organizing her belongings. Moonlight glared through the windows, bathing the guest room in an eerie glow. 

Wanda fidgeted with the quilted bedding, tracing stich after stich as she stumbled from thought to thought. The impulse to turn order to chaos had been drummed into her from birth. The apartment had been what realtors would label ‘cozy’ and ‘retro’. Wanda learned how to bury flawed furniture beneath crocheted doilies and dump emotions in a canyon of fear. 

She nuzzled her present from Lila and pushed away from the guilt saturated memories. These squishy pillows were all the rage among kids and naturally Costco had several varieties that spanned the animal kingdom. It is among the softest thing had ever owned. She didn’t deserve it. “I don’t know. This toy is…soft…but too much.” 

Natasha hummed as her eyes drifted closed involuntarily. From what Wanda understood, Nat and James received similar knock-off versions of the super-soldier serum. Which meant that Natasha could ignore injuries that would cripple most people. However, when she went down, she went down hard. 

The most recent assassination attempt left her learning to live without a spleen and a quarter of her liver. Hawkeye’s wife appeared to be the only entirely human individual that the director of S.H.I.E.LD. appeared to fear. 

Her mentor inhaled sharply and tensed at internalized pain. Wanda swallowed a remark of concern or heaven forbid a generic platitude. 

At least, Natasha had stopped trying to brush the seriousness of the injury aside, because Laura turned a funky shade of purple whenever she attempted to do anything other lay on the sofa. 

“The concept of presents without the whole quid pro quo thing, doesn’t make sense.” Natasha winced as she moved onto her back. 

Tylenol was the strongest pain medication Natasha would accept. Wanda pressed two tablets of acetaminophen into Nat’s palm. 

If the stubborn mule of a spy could literally take her medicine, Wanda may as well spill a little emotional blood. “It’s not how…I understand life. People are not kind for no reason.” Wanda fiddled with the soft ears of the toy animal. 

Nat murmured her agreement. She started speaking, but the loosely threaded connections frequently lost the plot of what Natasha meant to say. She tugged at her borrowed pajamas in frustration. 

Wanda studied her mentor. This conversation about childhoods that never existed and trauma that leeched at humanity had to occur another time. Natasha was not awake enough to think, let alone speak. 

Natasha sank into the mattress, her injured body tensing and relaxing in randomized spasms. 

Minutes slipped through Wanda’s fingers, like grains of sand through an hourglass. She listened to Natasha breathe and snore, it was like a surround sound white-noise machine. The therapists that made rounds at Stark’s Tower operated those little devices during sessions. 

Natasha whimpered as her bruised ribs protested her lungs expanding any more than necessary. A desire to protect the Black Widow surged through the younger woman. 

The warmth of the body next to her simultaneously embodied a threat and comfort. The Barton farmhouse morphed into bombed out buildings and pounds of cemented dust mixed with seared human remains. 

It didn’t feel like a corpse. Flashes of the bombing that destroyed her family splintered her attention. A scream formed in her stomach and lodged itself in her throat. Her mama, dead. Her skull partially exposed from debris. The nearly scalped head had been the only thing she could see for hours. 

Pietro had been delirious with shock and Wanda cradled as much of her twin in her arms as she could. Her father’s gasping breathes reminded her of fish. The ones who drowned on dry land in the hot summer sun. 

Warm meant harm. Pietro remained cold and full of holes, like a wet sponge in their kitchen sink. His soul had leaked out onto her clothes. His death stained Wanda’s existence. 

Thoughts and voices cycled through her brain and screamed directions at Wanda. She wanted nothing more than to bury herself the bottom of a vast ocean. Would she be able to contain her damned power, leagues under water? Wanda shoved at the stranger, her palms hot against their skin. 

The current of Nat’s nightmares towed her under the surface of the Black Widow’s mind. Trapped and paralyzed by powers beyond her control. She struggled against the onslaught of confounding stimuli that Nat’s mind flung at her. 

Wanda could not prevent herself from blurring with decades of trauma that the notorious Natalia Romanoff had experienced. Cries that Wanda could not identify threatened to burst from the confines of her skull. Unconsciousness would be a relief, but when had Maximoff ever been granted a reprieve? 

*** (Natasha's Memories) 

Mama. 

No. 

Please. Please, I can pay. 

You? 

I’m sorry. Whatever I did. I am sorry. 

People had many last words. Pleaded prayers uttered as they wet themselves with fear. Structured dissociation saved her from emotional reactions. For now. Natalia had seen sestras break under the stress of taking lives. 

The man stopped squirming with her knee crushing his trachea. Natalia inhaled, extinguished her own humanity and snapped his neck with ease. 

Theoretically, executions of single, paunchy middle-aged despots with erectile dysfunction and bald spots should be fun. 

Yelena savored her time away from the compound. She binged foods that Madam herself had never admitted to tasting. She absorbed foreign media like a sponge and internalized a rebellious attitude. 

Natalia allowed herself one of her sestra’s illegally imported candies, but forced herself to comply with the general rigidity of the Red Room. She moved through exercises with practiced boredom. Natalia moved out of habit, she executed warm-up stretches to piano music that haunted her. 

Five, Six, Seven, Eight. 

A checklist for assassins ticked through her brain. The point of the ridiculously expensive pump sent webbed cracks through the paned glass. A gentle tap shattered the entire window. She leapt from the ledge and landed heavily on the torn pavement. 

Every second she stalled increased her chances of being recovered. No, discovered. She had a retractable leash that tied her to the Red Room. The bond choked her throat, but allegiance to Madam was as permanent as a tattoo. 

*** (Natasha's Memories) 

She was composed of intersecting fault lines. Miniature earthquakes grated the bones of her skeleton together. Her teeth chattered, sending sharp pain shooting through her eye sockets. 

Just another cheap motel. Another honey pot operation. A chance to prove her loyalty to the ‘free’ version of the agency that had raised her. 

Spasms intensified as cramps rolled through her abdomen. Quaking arms barely held her weight as she struggled to position her head over the bowl. 

Vomit that contained nothing more than mucus tinged bile dripped into the rusted toilet. 

Natalia is not herself. She is off the grid. She is dead. Again. The kind of dead where she can choose the type of punishment that the Devil doles out. She deserves withdrawal. 

Her brain is a cacophony of sirens and alarms. They scream notifications of missed contacts and an overwhelming urge to vomit the last of her will to live. 

Mission complete. Mission complete. Mission complete. A telephone rang and Natalia wondered why no one answered. Her mouth fuzzed with saliva that she couldn’t manage to spit.

Time flowed like a river in Wonderland. She shrank and grew like Alice in response to the unpredictable nausea. 

Her tongue swelled with untold truths. She could keep her found family safe. Their secrets would stay clenched between her teeth. Under threat of death, Natalia would not let any harm come to them. 

Tremors locked her limbs in painful positions. Invisible restraints tethered her to the filthy tiled floor. 

*** (Natasha's Memories) 

Happy men die quietly. 

Madam’s words thumped at the base of her skull. Natalia had woken in a foreign bed. This, by itself was not unusual. 

The quality of the hotel, hovel really, had been what annoyed her. What was a mark doing in a hovel like this? 

Her spine cracked into alignment as she scanned her person for a weapon. The usual weighted knives, were strapped into their sheaths at her waist and ankles. 

No gun, but Nat had creativity to spare. Plenty of household objects made excellent weapons. 

Someone snored. 

Natalia realized she had reached the base of a wooden staircase when she trips over nothing. Stupid, useless girl. She punished herself with pinches to her ribs. 

The room she entered is covered in tacky décor and brightly colored toys. 

Children. 

Her stomach clenched with trepidation. The thought of toddlers was enough to make her hesitate. 

A soft groan followed by a shift in a body’s weight. The couch creaked with age and peaked Nat’s interest. 

The knives had become natural extensions of her hands. The clean-up from upholstery was a nightmare. It would need to burn, as would the rest of whatever this place was. 

The man’s face held familiarity, but Nat pushed her reluctance aside. Missions took priority. After all, she reasoned, her marks had begun to blur over the decades as the Black Widow. 

There had been much chatter internationally about her exploits. Even Soldat’s adventures had been overshadowed by her own. Madam and Yuri were less than thrilled with that development. Yelena had positively seethed with anger at the patriarchal system. 

Natalia had cracked a smile at her sestra’s outrage. Yelena had no problem with violence, but balked at the structured misogyny of the agency. 

“Nat?” 

Hesitation meant failure. Natalia lost her advantage; his death should have been instantaneous. Instead, he yawned and squirmed like a lazy cat. 

He should have been afraid, begging for his life or succumbing to any number of stereotypes. 

“Hey, insomnia is the worst. Why don’t you pull up some couch and pick a show?” 

The glare of the TV caught her tremoring hand and Natalia’s stomach bubbled with horrific insight.   
“Barton.” His name coated her tongue with guilt. 

“Unfortunately.” He answered. Clint passed Nat a lumpy pillow. “Trade you for…one of those.” He spotted most, if not all of her weapons. 

Shame crept from the tips of her toes to the very top of her scalp. There were no words that she could reach for that would suffice as an explanation to the man who saved her life. 

“Keep whatever you got where I can’t see it, and I’ll deal.” Clint used a controller for some gaming console to scroll through the streaming choices. “Laura will lose her mind if this couch gets another rip.” 

“Accident.” Natalia murmured. The Deaf girl took to weapons training as naturally as Yelena had. They had been practicing opening and closing pocket knives one-handed when a pillow had been fatally stabbed. Laura had turned a funny shade of panic pink when she’d entered the bloodbath of fluffy stuffing. 

“Exactly.” Clint winked as a laugh track delayed the relay for closed captioning that ran along the bottom of the Barton’s screen. He approved of ‘Aunt’ Nat’s life lessons. Skye had lived through enough horrors in her young life, she deserved to feel empowered. 

The sitcom flickered in the space their silence provided. A pair of red eyes pleaded through tears. Little Witch. Natalia knew the woman. She was intruding in private traumas, her memories. 

How dare she. How? The dream shrouded memory blurred as Nat began to fight. 

Rise, Natalia. 

Rise and be ready to comply, Madam demanded everything to achieve perfection. One wayward sestra would not break her marbleized exterior. 

***

Threats broke through the fragile barriers of their apartment. Soldiers. One terrible memory gave way to another. Wanda didn’t have a chance to brace herself against the tsunami of dread that loomed. 

Footsteps vibrated the floor she sat on. She would not be able to contain them for long, her focus flickered like a candle drowning in pooled wax. 

People screamed. The wailing sobs haunted her like a cassette tape of her worst moments. Wanda pressed her head between her hands, pleading with herself to wake. She almost missed the familiar damp cell that passed for H.Y.D.R.A. housing. 

“Pietro?” Emotion clogged her voice. He did not answer, where was he? Suspicion gnawed at Wanda. She could not remember a time when she could trust her mind. Snapshots of her life with her twin and parents were framed in horror. Everything else blurred like a dream. 

Truths that she’d known, pelted her with like bullets. Mama was dead. The tang of blood triggered her gag reflex. 

The monsters in her brain roared. Papa would eventually die, loudly while Pietro sobbed in her arms. Wanda had survived. She had not wanted to live without them, which is why she had been damned to exist. 

A voice interrupted Wanda’s futile attempts to anchor herself. “Clint, this is so not the time for games.” The woman sighed. “We’re not rock, paper, scissoring for who…” 

“Just an idea.” A man spoke, groaning along with his joints as he bent. He smelled warm and tired. Wanda shuddered involuntarily. Countless nights in H.Y.D.R.A.’s custody had begun with similar sensations. 

“Division of labor, like diaper duty.” He muttered under his breath. Wanda snuck a peek at him. For the briefest moment, his face caught her attention. 

Voices rose and struggled to be heard over each other. The argument sounded practiced and hollow of any real anger. 

Their voices overlapped and Wanda lost the thread of the conversation. She needed to move, why wasn’t she able to act?

“Oh no. Babe. We need ice.” The woman’s voice lulled her like a siren’s song. Wrong. Wrong, Wanda might be able to trust this one…but why? 

“Hey, Wanda.” How did the soldier know her name? They made a point to keep the experiments as close to animals as possible. They tossed bits of food into cells like zoo keepers. She lapped at milk like a feral cat, the concrete floor grating her tongue. 

“Wanda? It’s alright, Little Witch.” Her body shivered, power radiating from her like fevered heat as Barton reached for the slight woman. 

“Don’t!” The Black Widow panted from the opposite corner of the guest room. “Don’t. Nyet, not safe.” Her words cut with a scalpel’s precision. The phrase death by a thousand cuts popped into her head. Nat had read passages from her private collection when she had first arrived at Stark’s opulent prison. Sleep eluded both women and Nat took her role as a sestra quite seriously. 

Laura attempted to soothe her friend, but her ministrations couldn’t breach the terror. “Nat, listen. Everything is okay. Let’s get you back in bed. Hmm?” She asked permission to touch her, but Natasha was beyond being able to hear the request. “The floor has to be hurting in all the wrong places. Your stitches…” Laura clucked her tongue like a mother hen. 

“Laura.” Natasha grabbed the woman’s shoulders. “Don’t touch her. She knows, she knows…” Nat sobbed. She folded into Laura’s arms, popping several stiches as she situated herself. 

“Honey.” Laura sought her husband’s face. In terms of bad nights, this one ranked just above the time Natasha had nearly bled out in their bathroom. “Nat, can you hear me love? You are right here with me, with Clint. Let’s breath. In and out, can you feel this?” She rubbed Natasha’s paralyzed fingers. 

Clint rocked back on his heels, muscles tensed in practiced defense. He spoke in hushed tones, meant to calm, but all Wanda registered were accusations. 

The Black Widow had witnessed the darkest part of herself. Handlers had replaced mercy with rage when they created a breathing weapon that had no allegiances. Natalia and Soldat should understand her better than anyone, so why had she harmed them? 

Natasha, the person who recognized her humanity after H.Y.D.R.A. had nearly extinguished her soul had been burned by her power. 

The curse that lashed out at those around her and tortured her with intrusive nightmares of her allies had harmed the innocent people at this farmhouse. 

She was as much a monster as the world thought. 

***


	4. Sneaking Suspicions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Once standing, Wanda’s body rebelled against the change in position. Goose pimples popped up along her skin as her vision began to tunnel. 
> 
> James seized her wrists. Wanda barely had time to draw a breath before she lost control as her powers took root in his mind. 
> 
> It’s worse than being strangled with a lanyard and suffocating under the weight of the handlers. James’ pain is a white-hot brand. The iron annihilated her connection to her own body. Wanda’s magic throbbed in time to James’ catastrophic injury. He had lost an arm and his humanity to the same people that burdened her with her powers. 
> 
> His pain is unrelenting and strikes with the accuracy of a viper that never runs out of venom. 
> 
> How could any creature have survived this torture? Daily. The cruelty that he endured under the guise of molding him into a weaponized human. 
> 
> All of her senses have been amplified to the point that she no longer registers any individual stimuli. 
> 
> Electricity scorched the bottoms of Soldat’s feet and twists his legs into a convulsive dance. His body bucks and contorts against the bonds of the customized chair.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, musical theater is a balm for my tired soul. This chapter moves between Wanda and James' perspectives on one of the first team movie nights.

***

Sam Wilson paused Hollywood’s adaptation of Rent mid-scene. The character known as Mimi blurred on the screen, a carousel of color and curls squinted her eyes as she reached the end of a solo. “How do you know all the words to this?” 

Barnes shook the bowl of popcorn he and Steve were meant to share. The chocolate pieces had sunk to the bottom and rang like stodgy bells every time he shifted. He sat by himself on a loveseat, Steve curled into a customized armchair. The furniture touched, but they did not. 

The day had started out well enough, but James lost more spoons than he had predicted needing. Sam had shared information about Spoon Theory and chronic illness soon during James extended stay in Wakanda. Many of the resources had resonated with both men as they navigated Bucky’s recovery. 

As a result, both men sat in their respective corners, trying to immerse themselves in the comradery of movie night. Steve rubbed the stubble on his chin. “I think Buck would agree that the definition of a musical has changed…”

Tony barked out a laugh. “Since the two of you lumbered like dinosaurs through the city?” 

Rogers turned the color of Iron Man’s suit, while James blinked through the fog of dissociation. 

“He swaggers, Stark. While Rogers runs faster than a cheetah.” Sam commented. 

Banner had himself situated on the shaggy area rug. His spine was as straight as a pin, thanks to years of disciplined yoga practice. “I can barely keep up with the plot, I missed the show’s first run…because of the Big Guy.” 

“Don’t worry Brucie-bear, we’ve got access to all theater you could want.” Tony shot a dramatic wink at his friend. 

Bruce spoke through a mouthful of frozen yogurt. He had recently discovered the world of frozen vegan dessert. Now the man oscillated between scalding cups of tea and mugs of creamy treats. “My PhDs don’t apply to musicals and the nuance of the great Broadway, but I appreciate your willingness to teach me.” 

“Oh no, would you like captions Wanda?” Pepper fiddled with her phone, plugging into the television’s controls. 

Wanda blushed and shrugged with all the nuance of a kid caught with their hand in a pack of Oreos. “No. I understand.” She answered while keeping her eyes focused on her lap. 

Two discs of music from the original cast recording had made their way to her mother. She played it for the twins while cooking dinner. Spicy strew bubbled on the stove as she danced around the kitchen. She and Pietro took turns pulling their mother’s multi-colored skirt. She remembered the cool tile as she stomped her bare feet in time to the drum solo that Angel sang. 

“Yeah, you’ve got that whole…accent thing. How is that possible?” Stark wiggled his fingers in her general direction. 

Pepper warned her fiancé after jolting with a shock of embarrassment. “Tony! We talked about this.” Her seltzer dribbled down the sides of the can. 

“What? Half of communication with her is a miming exercise.” 

Steve pinched the bridge of his nose, like he was warding off a haunting or a migraine. Both options were probably rooted in communicating with Tony. 

The teenage vigilante remained oblivious to the simmering tension in the Common Room. “Mr. Barton and Ms. Widow are awesome teachers. Skye’s been teaching me some ASL.” Peter poured a plastic bag of brightly colored treats into the popcorn bowl. He was tutoring Hawkeye’s oldest daughter in algebra. They communicated via video chat and were learning how to communicate with each other in their own way. 

“Ah. The old quid pro quo.” Tony only half listened, his attention mostly on his tablet. 

Peter blushed. “No!” 

“Relax, Under-roos. I know its Hawkeye’s kid. Eat your chocolate.” Tony rolled his eyes as he signaled Sam to re-start the movie. “Do you need anything Mini-Widow?” 

“Oh.” Wanda flushed. Conversations were a currency that the Avengers spend without thought. They didn’t have to scrimp and save words for consumption. 

The teenager offered her a box of something that she couldn’t identify. The film resumed, a familiar song reverberated against her skull. She did not want to go out, not tonight, not ever. The character Mimi hung from a rickety fire escape and Wanda glanced at one of windows that housed the view of the NYC skyline. 

Her throat tightened, making swallowing impossible. 

“M&M’s. So yummy.” Peter smiled, shaking the box like that would entice her. 

There had been a time in her recent history where ‘candy’ meant a party she hated. One where they had forced her to wear nightmarish clothes, chained and were paraded around the compound. 

Internment under H.Y.D.R.A. had been one long experiment for the children. Wanda assumed that the adults she encountered there, had some agency in their lives. But living among the Winter Soldier and Black Widow had her questioning those judgements. 

Maybe no one had control of their own fate. Pietro and the powers of the damned space stone had died. Now she was the only one who remained. 

Who would ever trust her words? Wanda certainly did not trust herself. She picked at a thread on the cushion. The chair she occupied dwarfed her, but the blankets that Pepper had provided made an oddly comforting nest. She didn’t deserve their kindness, but she found herself burrowing into the plush blankets. Wanda hated herself, but the warmth made her feel like movement was impossible. 

Her body sagged under the comforting weight of the fabric. Her bones leeched a painful memory like chemical weapons. 

Pietro…had been punished for her performance at the officer’s gala. The breath of their horny mouths prickled the hair on the back of her neck. The rest of the Avenger’s did not bristle at her ghosts. They taunted her. 

She must have made a noise at the intrusive memory, because when she lifted her head, the only person staring back at her was Soldat himself. 

The play must go on. Wanda shrouded herself in the role of an aloof young woman. She had no business pretending to be a typical teenager, but Soldat’s gaze spurred her to try. 

Wanda continued to drift in a sea of sensations. The dim room masked what the soft blankets could not hide. 

***

James nodded along to Sam’s anecdote. To be honest, he had lost the plot of the story several sentences and minutes ago. 

“Mm.” Steve continued to wind yarn as he politely faked active listening. That was one skill that hadn’t been rendered obsolete by the time he thawed from the ice. He knew how to encourage his friend with a perfectly time grin, sarcastic huff of breath or an empathetic furrowed brow. 

James tapped the crochet hook on his knee. He had his legs pulled tight against his torso, as if hunching his body in half could contain the multitudes of pain that decades of torture had stained his marrow like a morbid tattoo. 

The damned pattern that Laura had taught him a couple weeks before, slid in and out of focus at random. Frustration heated his fingers and made the stitches uneven. 

Phantom pain radiated from where his arm should be. The prosthetic had rubbed his stump raw and Sam insisted he go without it for at least a week. James couldn’t crochet one handed, but liked the feel of twirling the hook between his fingers. So, Steve wound skeins of yarn like a dutiful partner as they watched a modern musical with the team. 

James kept his eyes on Maximoff. 

It wasn’t predatory…at least he hoped no one assumed the worst of a former assassin. But that was nothing new. The man privileged with confidence in a war-torn America had been utterly obliterated under the Red Room’s control. The life he used to lead in Brooklyn had been buried under decades of trauma. 

The characters sang in strife on the screen and cut through the fog of his spiraling thoughts. 

Steve nudged his attention towards the slim smartphone. Stupid technology. Laura’s name popped up as the device vibrated. She’d sent him a series of pictures. The Barton’s kitchen is coated in a dusting of flour, which is par for the course when making cookies with children. Or Tony. That man shared a toddler’s attention span with Clint’s youngest child, Lila. 

Natalia…Natasha actually. James corrected himself internally. He didn’t know who he was half the time he was awake and moving through the Tower like a ghost. 

More often than not, he still perceived Stevie as a skinny, chronically ill stubborn punk. He didn’t recognize his current body in mirrored surfaces. The face that stared back reflected experiences that the boxes of S.H.I.E.L.D. stamped files proved to be true. But he could not recall them. 

His former partner from the Red Room texted him. She used words sparingly, meaning that he had to infer between the line of the message itself. Smoky memories cluttered his already confusing relationship with Natalia. She asked as simple question, but James struggled to answer. 

How was the little witch coping? Unknown. She veiled herself in playing the role of an immigrant, baffled by everything the Avengers had to offer. 

Now Wanda tossed a metaphorical wrench into James’ adjustment to modern life. All evidence from agencies that hunted him stated that he and Nat knew of Wanda’s existence. Stevie asked him more than once if he remembered anything about the Maximoff twins. 

He did. He didn’t. The truth lay somewhere in the middle of that muddled thought process. 

He had been complicit in so many of their deaths. Children and broken teenagers had been lured into H.Y.D.R.A.’s sphere of influence by promises that they never intended on keeping. 

Random employees in Stark’s phallic shaped Tower matched pieces of bodies he’d torn apart during his years as their pet murderer. Each experience rattled him more than the last. Which is why, he preferred to isolate himself in the Steve’s suite. 

Sam often teased him about being a hermit, but Banner never made fun of him for keeping to himself. The quiet scientist understands more than he cared to admit about fearing oneself, of that James was quite sure. 

Steve’s negotiating skills had been honed during diplomatic missions at Fury’s request. Which is how James found himself begrudgingly agreeing to attend family movie nights with the Avengers every Saturday night. Recently, insomnia had weakened his resistance to fight Steve on socializing. 

Another song ended. The stark contrast between dialogue and music made him zone back into the moment. 

“Buck?” 

He looked at his partner. What had he missed? Conversations often swirled around him, like water flowing around an ancient rock in a river. 

“Tony’s going to pause for a bathroom break.” Steve plopped the ball of yarn in a specialized ceramic bowl. “Do you need anything?” 

James made himself shake his head. Steve wasn’t a threat. There was no right answer, or choice that would lead to punishment. 

“Okay.” Steve offered him a pitying smile. 

James fought an impulse to respond with a gesture that would have had his mother reaching for the broom. He hated feeling so emotionally volatile and weak. Lack of REM sleep made him grumpier than Carol’s mythical cat-like alien pet. 

***

“Here. I’ll be right back.” Peter leapt from the couch that had been squashed against Wanda’s cozy chair. Movie night was usually well attended, but ‘Rent’ had drawn most of the Avenger’s attention. As a result of the interest, many pieces of furniture had been squashed in a funky semi-circle around the TV. 

Wanda stared at the coated candies and tried not to gag. 

“Don’t have a sweet tooth?” 

She startled, several colorful candies leapt from the bowl into Wanda’s lap. 

The man who frequently starred in her nightmares, the Winter Soldier himself, stood in front of her. He shuffled in front of her, clad in flannel pajama bottoms that featured hedgehogs and rabbits. Wanda’s brain struggled to compute what her eyes saw. 

Wanda answered in Polish, her brain fuzzy with adrenaline. 

James’ mouth curled into a near smile. He stretched on tiptoes and rocked back on his heels. Sitting for so long, must not to easy when you’re trained to never relax. Wanda knew this, firsthand. 

“How about some tea? Natalia lets me use her chamomile blend. She says I waste her good stuff by steeping it too long.” He gathered his long hair in a bun while Wanda considered his offer. 

“I wouldn’t know how to judge tea or anything with that kind of expertise.” Wanda mumbled. 

James commented. “She’s one of a kind.” The tension between them didn’t escalate. It stagnated and plateaued into a manageable unease. 

Once standing, Wanda’s body rebelled against the change in position. Goose pimples popped up along her skin as her vision began to tunnel. 

James seized her wrists. Wanda barely had time to draw a breath before she lost control as her powers took root in his mind. 

It’s worse than being strangled with a lanyard and suffocating under the weight of the handlers. James’ pain is a white-hot brand. The iron annihilated her connection to her own body. Wanda’s magic throbbed in time to James’ catastrophic injury. He had lost an arm and his humanity to the same people that burdened her with her powers. 

His pain is unrelenting and strikes with the accuracy of a viper that never runs out of venom. 

How could any creature have survived this torture? Daily. The cruelty that he endured under the guise of molding him into a weaponized human. 

All of her senses have been amplified to the point that she no longer registers any individual stimuli. 

Electricity scorched the bottoms of Soldat’s feet and twists his legs into a convulsive dance. His body bucks and contorts against the bonds of the customized chair. 

Wanda is a useless observer to the memory that haunts James. Her magic screams and boils her blood as she can do nothing, but witness his suffering. 

***

She comes to in a dimmed, near empty room that carries a faint familiarity. Every inch of her body is bruised to the bone. 

Her sanity is utterly fractured, but Wanda cannot recall the last time she felt in control of her mind. 

Canned laughter that sounded like Pietro can’t be separated from whoever tries to get her attention. 

“Stay down.” A hand lands on her chest, just below her neck and Wanda can’t stop herself from flinching. 

The voice is kind, in a way that makes Wanda want to sag in relief. “Please.” The man did not sound like a handler or guard. But she can’t make herself trust the man’s sympathetic tone. 

The man whose privacy her powers had just invaded…is dying? Maybe fatally so. If his heart was still beating, he is barely alive. 

“Bucky’s here. He’s alright.” 

Wanda’s powers prickled at the lie. Bucky. James Buchanan Barnes. The gentle voice belonged to Steve, the man who somehow loved and accepted several assassins and one part-time Hulk. 

Captain Rogers watched her with concern etched in his otherwise smooth, yet exhausted face. “Just a seizure. Sam’s timing it…” He seemed to swallowed a thought and pivoted to her well-being. “Do you have a history of anything like that? Not that I know much, but we want to keep you well Wanda. We want to help.” 

Before Wanda could process the question, a flurry of activity erupted on the other side of the Common Room.

“Rogers.” Wilson called. The seriousness fogged Wanda’s ability to concentrate. 

“Go, go.” Someone shooed Rogers away. Dizziness made Wanda close her eyes and focus on breathing. The nausea only intensified. 

Vomiting would only make her headache worse. The pounding pain thrummed a mantra of don’t, don’t, don’t, but her mouth was sucked dry of all saliva. 

“There’s no shame in puking okay? Aunt May always says that the body knows best. She’s awesome. Mr. Stark invited us to dinner on Wednesday after the press conference. I guess we’ll see you there, right? I still haven’t mastered tying a tie. But maybe I can practice between now and then.” The exuberant teenager chatted. Peter, Peter Parker. His name was a song set to the tune of a nursery rhyme. 

“I don’t know what to say. I’m not good with this sort of thing. But you’re going to be okay. Dr. Banner is really good at helping. Mr. Barnes is getting help, medicine and all that stuff. He knows a nurse in Hell’s Kitchen who is really cool. Her stitches don’t hurt at all. Well, she uses a local…but still!” Peter sputtered. “Not that you need stitches…do you? Oh god, are you bleeding anywhere? I can’t see…it’s too dark.” He paused to gulp a lungful of air. 

Wanda could barely maintain residence in her body. She had no way of knowing if she had sustained any injuries, visible ones anyway. 

“Mr. Stark and Mr. Cap want you to stay awake.” Peter cupped her cheek, his freckled nose suddenly very close to hers. “I’m gonna help you.” 

No one can help me. 

She clenched her eyes, set her jaw and retreated to that place in her mind where the monsters’ roars were dulled by looped memories. 

Audio clips of Pietro’s laugh, Mama’s singing and Papa’s boots scuffing the floors wrapped her in appeasing denial. 

Her dead family teased her with sitcom-like antics, while the Winter Soldier screamed just outside their bombed-out apartment. 

***


	5. Where There's a Will, there's Weaponized Grief

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wanda stretched, pointing and flexing her toes under the soft sheets. The memories she’d unintentionally screened after she’d touched Natasha played whenever she closed her eyes. 
> 
> The Black Widow danced with shards of glass in her pointe shoes. Wanda’s own toes prickled with pain, but it wasn’t real. Natasha executed perfect pirouettes that flowed into combinations of steps on diagonal. Her magic kept her wrapped in hallucinations of solitary confinement. 
> 
> She would never reach the heights that the right and left hands of the Red Room had invented. But Wanda tried. She always tried. For Pietro and the memory of her parents. A pained noise escaped from the back of Wanda’s throat. 
> 
> “Hmm.” Even though she appeared peaceful, Nat proved to be just on the edge of consciousness. “Little witch.”

***

The night Wanda chose revenge, she grappled with the air mattress in Clint’s guestroom. Everything about the bedding itched. She had developed an allergy to comfort, and strawberries. Her throat had rejected the brightly colored fruit. Laura nursed her on the bathroom floor. A pair of miracles in the form of pink pills eliminated the hives and made her feel all warm and faded. 

Wanda exhaled. An ancient fan blew humid air around the quiet space. It emitted constant noise, but not cooled air. The events of the day had brought more questions than answers. 

Natasha whispered as she dozed above a meadow of dusty shadowed creatures. Wanda caught every thirds word or so, but couldn’t identify the language she spoke. The clumps of dust mutated in the dimmed light and preyed on Wanda’s fears. 

Wanda stretched, pointing and flexing her toes under the soft sheets. The memories she’d unintentionally screened after she’d touched Natasha played whenever she closed her eyes. 

The Black Widow danced with shards of glass in her pointe shoes. Wanda’s own toes prickled with pain, but it wasn’t real. Natasha executed perfect pirouettes that flowed into combinations of steps on diagonal. Her magic kept her wrapped in hallucinations of solitary confinement. 

She would never reach the heights that the right and left hands of the Red Room had invented. But Wanda tried. She always tried. For Pietro and the memory of her parents. A pained noise escaped from the back of Wanda’s throat. 

“Hmm.” Even though she appeared peaceful, Nat proved to be just on the edge of consciousness. “Little witch.” 

Weren’t witches supposed exude confidence? Books portrayed them as calculating and knowledgeable. Wanda knew that she possessed none of those qualities. 

“Yeah. Here I am.” She made herself audible, but every word burned her throat like anaphylaxis. 

The woods that surrounded the Barton’s farm had failed to contain her Wanda’s anguish. Why did she run? Because…maybe she could channel her dead twin’s mutation and outpace a demon or two along the way. 

Paperwork for her asylum made less sense than her imprisonment at Hydra’s tentacles. Pepper and a team of lawyers sat around a heavy conference table and studied her with the same morbid curiosity that H.Y.D.R.A.’s scientist had. 

She didn’t remember shattering the paneled glass walls. She hadn’t felt the blood as she crouched like a feral animal in the debris. She absorbed the pained sobs of the legal team and Ms. Potts. Embarrassment heated her face and hands as her magic thrummed just under her skin. 

Somehow, Wanda had showed Pepper how she knew Soldat. She exposed his crimes with surgical precision. The blonde CEO gasped like a dying fish with the recognition of Bucky’s history. It was one thing to know an ex-assassin lived. It was quite another to know that the man who sported a man-bun and made espresso chocolate chunk cookies murdered your husband’s parents in cold blood. 

The wound that had begun to knit together had been torn in spectacular fashion. Unintentionally, Wanda had served as a catalyst for the most recent division among the Avengers. Yet another catastrophe that she stood at the center of, everything she touched turned to ash. Her decomposing biological family served as evidence of that. 

Bruce had Hulked out and nearly escaped from the 73rd story. Now he was safely contained in a pod of Banner and Stark’s creation. Wanda held herself responsible for the scientist being imprisoned. 

Clint had literally flown from the fallout, with Nat and the Little Witch in tow. Apparently, S.H.I.E.L.D. training included learning how to hotwire anything with an engine. Wanda hadn’t been aware of much for the duration of the flight. The harness numbed her to everything, save for being trapped in something similar to a straightjacket. 

Natasha, barely able to sit on her own, save for her own stubbornness that supported her spine like steel rods had spent the flight using her professional skills to ream Stark and his army of employees for their behavior. 

The details of the solo mission that injured Natasha remained confidential, but whatever had happened left Clint fuming at his partner and the man who looked about as friendly as death himself. Nicholas J. Fury’s name had been scrawled across many a threat assessment in Wanda’s files. Apparently, she required therapy and continuous monitoring. 

Wanda turned onto her side, her knees drawn to her chest. The mattress squeaked under her weight. Once she was confident that Natasha had slipped into peaceful unconsciousness, she whispered to herself. The delirium of the day left Wanda vulnerable to believing that she was alone. 

But Natasha listened. She slowed her pulse and mimicked rest, while cracks extended along her already taxed heart. The Little Witch’s life mirrored the brainwashing she had been defined by for years. 

By comparison, Maximoff had lived a normal life. She had a childhood, with parents and a sibling by birth. Guilt chased the thoughts as she experienced them. Sure, all of Wanda’s family were now dead. But she had cooked in a real kitchen and watched television with people who loved her without conditions. 

Natasha knew that jealousy spurred this storm of thoughts. Even the notorious Winter Soldier had once had something that resembled a normal life in America. 

She recognized that it wasn’t fair to envy people had been tortured and broken. But she did. Did that damn her more than the dozens of lives she’d taken in the name of an agency she had been chained to since youth. Wanda sobbed into the bedding, barely audible to anyone not trained to listen because their life depended on it. 

The ghosts of the children, men and women she’d murdered in cold blood haunted her most during the quiet. Left to her own devices, she would keep herself busy so she’d never have a chance to dwell on the guilt. The Maximoffs had been tortured, because she and Soldat weren’t enough to quench the Red Room’s lust for supremacy. 

***

Repeated vibrations jolted him from his near sleep. Thanks to statistics, he could be reasonably sure a nightmare was waiting for him as soon as he crossed into sleep. 

He could ignore the notification. It was probably a social media post, tagging him in a photo that implicated him in yet another crime against humanity. That could definitely wait until morning. Or never. 

The vibrations ceased and Bucky sighed. During his original tour of war-torn Europe, he learned to doze anywhere. The back of a truck with no suspension, moldy sand bags and water-logged canvas tents become perfectly acceptable places to nap. A favored spot consisted of dry sweet-smelling hay in the warm French country side. Good times were had by the Howling Commandos while on rear guard duty. He grimaced at the memory, knowing all of his former soldiers were dead. The man who fought beside them had been systematically eliminated before the world had come to a fragile peace. 

Three tones chimed, indicating he had a new voicemail. He kept his phone on silent mode, mostly because no one called him. Dread dumped a fresh load of adrenaline into his veins. For him, PTSD manifested traditional way that the public understood, like keeping his back to walls and avoiding triggers he knew about like obvious gore. But the extent of his unique trauma and repeated TBIs had also manifested in more rare symptoms, like his seizures and complicated relationship to the freezers in grocery stores. 

Steve’s ringtone launched him upright, the comforter bunched around his waist. Their cell phones were private, like beyond accessible to anyone without a dozen security clearances. Tony and Pepper had cooperated with a contact of Jones’, creatively nicknamed ‘Micro’ to ensure federal government level encryption and privacy of their individual devices. 

“Hell?” Steve muttered. The last letter of the word was buried in the plump pillow that he rubbed his face against. He peeked at Buck, not really seeing him. 

Bucky reacted automatically with his eyes closed. Stevie’s voice threw him backwards in time, he felt connected to his inner 10-year-old, sitting on an uncomfortable wooden pew at the back of the local church. “And also, with you.” He moved his stump to cross himself before blearily looking around the bedroom. 

“Amen.” Steve added, rolling onto his stomach. He hugged a pillow and nuzzled his face against the sheets. 

He lunged for the phone and fumbled with the sensitive touch screen. Bucky peeled the device away from his ear to double-check the name on the call. Hawkeye, he operated on a nocturnal schedule like him and Nat. “Forgive him, he knows not what he says in sleep.” 

“He needs more beauty rest than us ugly folks.” 

“Hey! I got a lot of dates with dames back in my heyday.” 

“Yeah…I’m not touching that one with a ten-thousand-foot pole.” He spoke quietly into the phone, but he sounded like the man he had come to know in recent months. 

Bucky rolled his eyes and smirked. “You didn’t call just to tease me.” 

“Only kind of. Anyway, how’s the fallout?” Segues were not Clint’s best skill, but he tried. 

Bucky eased himself out of the warm bed. He quietly closed the door to the bedroom and made his way to the sofa. His thoughts turned to Steve, who had silently cried as he skimmed over Maximoff’s plea for asylum. With Wanda’s permission, Nat had shared her rough draft with Bucky and by proximity, Stevie. 

International courts were demanding a teenager be remanded to the Raft pending trial. Governments of all sizes gnashed their teeth at the young scapegoat. Sam blocked all coverage from being streamed anywhere on the residential floors. 

The Maximoff twins. Bucky held a snapshot of a memory where he heard handlers talking about the horrors the twins could manage in tandem. Her past, damned her to the world’s wrath. Wanda’s history…mirrored Nat and Bucky’s in terrifying ways. 

She could be damaged in ways that Bucky couldn’t pretend to ever understand. 

At least that’s what James could string together after a couple hours of Steve knocking the stuffing out of punching bags in the gym. “It’s not nuclear.” The ‘yet’ was left unsaid. 

Clint hummed and Bucky could hear him frowning through the phone. Unbiased and minimal reactions were not part of Clint’s normal communication skill set. 

Bucky could picture Clint fidgeting while he waited with minimal patience for him to respond. “I mean…Tony’s practically sedated. Potts overrode Jarvis, so he can’t have me arrested.” 

Hawkeye choked on a laugh. “Ah, that’s a classic Stark-move.” 

“It is?” Bucky had his life threatened more than the average person, but Tony aiming his tech directly over his heart felt like problem. 

Clint scoffed at the tension. “Oh yeah. You weren’t around when Deadpool waltzed into the lobby with me in his arms. He...well, that’s a story for another day.” 

Bucky settled himself on Roger’s impeccably clean couch. “Murdock said you smelled worse than the worst dumpster that day.” 

“He was there? Huh. That makes sense.” He yawned before continuing to muse. “I mean, it actually could have been a number of times really. For some reason, I always wind up in Hell’s Kitchen.” 

Bucky considered this phenomenon. It was a sensible conclusion. He knew that Barton’s dog was named Lucky, but the man deserved that name more than the adopted mutt. He was have wound up with the malfunctioning metal arm, but Hawkeye had a hell of a lock of internal replacement parts of varying degrees of steel. 

“Steve tried to punch his way out of conflict this afternoon.” He isolated himself to the stairs, barely breathing hard after descending more than thirty floors to the Olympic grade gym. 

“Did it work?”

He got all sweaty and tired. So, maybe? At least one of them had managed some sleep. “About as well as Nat throwing knives and me taking laps.” 

“He’ll be alright.” Clint said lamely. Platitudes were supposed to calm and even out emotions. But they made Bucky want to tear out his hair and scream. 

Instead of losing his shit, Bucky chose to ask a question. “How’s Nat?” 

“She’s finally asleep.” Both men had an unspoken agreement that ‘asleep’ meant simmering in unmanageable emotional turmoil until the sun rose, but it wasn’t actively self-harm. “I think…Wanda’s quiet too.” 

“Not necessarily a good thing, Barton.” Silence could mean plotting, and with Natasha that could literally mean anything. She had plans A-Z before anyone ever agreed to the abstract idea of the first plan. 

“One sec.” Muffled footsteps and the creaking of a door were audible. “They’re both cool, so’s Laura and the girls if you were wondering.” 

Bucky forced himself to breath slow and even in through his nose and out his mouth. “Thanks.” Laura was in her first trimester with the soon-to-be newest member of the clan. “Now, do you have any inkling of what comes next?” 

Clint cleared his throat. “Survive the press storm?” Prevent Nat from throwing herself into the cavern of doubt and guilt that fueled her perfectionism. Keep Wanda out of the notorious prison that profiled mutants and would hurt her in all the same ways the Red Room had. The media frenzy was the least of their concerns. 

“I’d rather go on a mission.” James gave an involuntary shudder at the thought of opening social media apps or moving for that matter. He had sunk into the couch and warmed the cushions and the afghan he had cocooned himself in. 

“Same.” His friend sighed audibly. 

“Well, in lieu of going off the grid to any number of safehouses you and Nat have all over the damned world, what can we do?” 

“That seriously limits our options, dude.” 

The line went for a long moment as both men took inventory of what would and wouldn’t work. Eventually, one of them started talking. That was all it took, an offering meant hope and Bucky realized that as long as he communicated, he’d always have an ally in Clint. Natasha had fiercely protected Barton and he was starting to understand why she trusted more than anyone in Stark’s squad of superheroes. 

The more James spoke, the more exposed he felt. He surmised that Natalia was unraveling in a similar fashion. Wanda had to be worse off than either of them, considering how young, traumatized and powerful she was. 

When both men ran out of words, Clint ended the call with a promise to call first thing after coffee and a good poop. 

A wave of nausea crested, leaving Bucky’s vison blurred. The children had suffered as Madam and Yuri’s puppets. Lucky ones were granted death and if memory served, fed the garden of the compound. He scrolled through a thread of conversations with Natasha as his mind wandered. 

The Maximoff twins had been indoctrinated during Soldat’s time. James did not have any linear memories from those decades. Most of the time, he didn’t mind this fact. Only when Wanda had finally worked up the courage to ask him about her brother, had Bucky regretted dissociating through the 1980 and 90s. 

The Red Room kept meticulous records that they tried to burn, but most of what he and Nat had done had been documented in film and print thanks to increased media coverage of Cold War tensions. 

The Black Widow generated rumors that overshadowed even his blood-soaked reputation. The memory wipes that obliterated their sense of selves testified to how dangerous they were as individuals. Together, they were strong. What would happen, if Madam’s most famous duo became a trio? 

***

“Are you sure?” 

A duffel bag sailed through the air as an answer. Wanda absorbed the impact without a sound and gnawed at her cheek. 

Natasha remained the classically trained ballerina. Her body executed calculated, precise movements that never wavered from their intended path. She wore compact bag that fell across her chest. She dressed in clothes that made her look like an impressively fit hiker. 

Wanda felt like an imposter, a child playing dress-up with clothes that didn’t belong to her. 

She packed what Natasha tossed on the wrinkled quilt. She imitated the trained spy’s packing techniques to the best of her ability, but ultimately balled most of the items and stuffed them unceremoniously in the bag. 

Wanda tasted copper as handled the knives and a med kit that included several surgical implements into a large backpack. 

Over the next thirty minutes, Natasha systemically emptied the previously pristine guest room. Wanda had received a primer in espionage, but Natasha played in expert mode. She extracted the paperwork for aliases, concealed weapons, and armored clothes from increasingly surprising places. 

“Natasha.” 

The woman tucked what looked like a toiletry bag into an oversized purse. The sound it made as it landed at the bottom of the bag led Wanda to believe bullets were part of the travel-sized collection. “Leave you cell here. Everything can be tracked. What languages have you mastered?” Natasha asked these questions with the same bored tone one might use to ask about weekend plans or the forecast. 

“Okay.” Wanda found herself nodding before the Black Widow finished speaking. “Polish, Serbian, Armenian, Russian, a little German and French. Can understand little Finnish, but…” The questions were framed in such an authoritative tone, she answered without obsessively second guessing her response. 

She dismissed Wanda’s ramble with a wave of her hand, her expression never wavering from one of intense concentration. 

Just as Natasha straddled the window sill, Wanda blurted “Why are you doing this?” 

She gripped the handle of the laptop bag, which definitely held more than a mere computer. Natasha reached out a hand towards the Little Witch. “Because I can choose my path now. When Barton made that call…he saved my life, he gave me something I never had. Autonomy.” 

Wanda took a tentative step towards the Widow. “Why…risk them? Family you have found? For nobody like me.” 

“Because, we are a kind of family too.” Natasha tipped herself onto the roof and rolled silently into the humid summer air. 

The crazy kind, Wanda swallowed the instinct to run from the ex-assassin and professional spy. The inky sky had rendered her depth perception utterly useless. Her eyes strained to find evidence of the ground that logic told her, definitely existed. 

Natasha clicked her tongue, signaling Wanda to act. She squashed thought, forcing herself to move. 

And so, Wanda pitched herself through the window and followed the woman she had idealized for most of her young life into the night that simmered with cicadas and possibility. 

***

“Come on, come on.” She held exposed wires and willed her powers to coax animation out of the locking mechanism. But her hands tremored from withdrawal. Whatever they had been dosing her with caused reality and imagination to dissolve and separate like experiments in science class. 

Working with the Black Widow had been one hell of an internship. Over the many weeks, maybe months since they had left the Barton’s farm, Wanda had hardened into a paranoid novice spy with intermittent mutant abilities. 

The Pietro that lived in her head smiled at what her resume to university could resemble. All typed in perfect English and printed on starchy bright paper at their county library. 

A shadow of something between an insect and rodent caught Wanda’s attention. Chemicals probably made the pests mutants, like H.Y.D.R.A. had done with her and Pietro. The door remained shut and her efforts only succeeded further exhausting the drained teenager. 

She retreated to the bricked wall, furthest from the door. The world tilted before her eyes and she stumbled against the imagined shifting floor. The wall claimed more skin on her cold exposed back as she slid to the concrete floor. 

The entirety of the cell reeked of mildew and urine. Even the bile that she’d vomited had been absorbed into the concrete. If she had an ounce of Peter’s brain, she could probably calculate how long they had been imprisoned. 

Wanda had stopped shivering from cold, but her body acted without her mind’s permission. Her body came back to her in fits and starts. Her thigh twitched. Her ears rang. Time marched on without her permission. 

All Wanda could manage, was to keep her eyes open. It was a childish notion. As if doing so, she could somehow sense Natasha’s presence. She craved proof of life, but her senses gained no new information. Painful silence echoed off the damp bricked walls. So, Wanda mentally reviewed all that Natasha had taught her. 

Wanda had learned how to activate machines, bind ribs and toes so tightly that they didn’t ache with every pump of a heart, bury her bodily needs and what Natasha called ‘amateur’ interrogation techniques. 

What she hasn’t mastered was confidence. Okay, maybe that was an unreasonable simplification of how they got here. 

Here being a literal underground maze of damp cells that made the American version of solitary confinement look like day camp. She broke every rule that had been drilled into her by the Black Widow. They had been separated days ago. Maybe weeks. Time ceased to hold value. 

Nothing remains in her digestive tract. She must be consuming her brain tissue for energy. Maybe that meant, soon she would cease to feel. Hope fluttered in her abdomen like a cramp. The lack of water could hurry her towards death. 

Wanda had resorted to peeing in the corner her closet sized space, but she had not done that in…quite a while. Dehydration made it difficult for Wanda to think. 

Natasha had stopped responding to her knocks through the shared wall. She hadn’t screamed, spat or cursed at their tormentors. Rumination led to dread which chased panicked irregular breathing. Wanda could not recall the last time she’d spoke. People threatened, yelled and spit. But Wanda hadn’t responded with speech. Or had she? 

Everyone she cared for, died. Their captors knew how to play with their minds. Psychological warfare aroused at least one of the guards. Wanda bore bruises as evidence of that game. 

Enough. A tidal wave of rage boiled Wanda’s organs. Tension built until she couldn’t bear another moment of the torture. Her screams sounded inhuman to her fractured eardrums. She panted, her nails ragged and ripping against the shitty concrete. 

The more oxygen that reached her brain, the more aware of her surroundings Wanda became. She had managed to break through the cell basement walls, but had only found a maze of more concrete. They are lab rats. Panic consumes her. Pietro’s screams are trapped in the damp tunnels like bottled potions. 

The blast summoned scores of eager recruits. They will not spare Natasha. She’s already injured. How badly, Wanda can’t be sure. None of her training, has given her any inkling of what to do. How to save her. How to quiet the storm that raged inside her mutated DNA. 

It’s an act of a damned woman that she finally chose. Wanda extracted her contraband and entered the passcode. Natasha would channel a quiet fury that truly terrified her, if she knew that Wanda had snuck a smartphone on their journey. 

“Now, now.” Normally orders are barked, but this devil’s voice is thinly veiled rage. It’s quiet in the way a storm paused after each roll of thunder and bolt of lightning. The reprieve can’t be trusted. “What a rarity you are.” 

Glass crunched under his steel toed boots. She prayed her fingers formed coherent words and steeled herself for the punishment. Death might be a relief. 

Wanda summoned the last of her strength to twist the phone beyond recognition as anything technology related. 

Barely a second of hesitation and Wanda had lost the tactical advantage. The former smartphone blended into the rest of the debris as his baton struck her spine with enough volts to bring down Soldat himself. 

Liberation from the agony of the prod came as unconsciousness charged towards her. She is shrouded in pain and wrath before her body slams into the floor. While Wanda’s brain flickered against the electric current, her magic acted without her consent. 

It coursed from her limbs, lashing out to defend its’ host. Wanda’s screams evoke terror in the mindless soldiers that flooded the halls. 

“Enough!” A man, unmatched in strength by his subordinates ripped a bar from the cell door. He struck Wanda with enough force to launch her across the narrow space. Her body bent at unnatural angles on the concrete floor. 

Even unconscious; her powers seek out targets. Tentacles of magic bind their throats, strangling and burning their skin. Torturing them to insanity would amount to nothing compared to what Natasha could inflict. Wanda struggled against the tsunami of power that controlled her broken body like a warped marionette. 

She would rise, rise and unleash herself on the bastards. Her power roared louder than her damaged body and mind. She raged. 

Until the human fodder that fell upon her wave after wave finally gained the upper hand. They overwhelmed her with additional prods until the Scarlet Witch succumbed to oblivion. 

***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! This chapter will be the last one in what I've discovered is Part 1 of this Maxim(off) the Trauma series. I have so much planned for the next part, please subscribe to the series and I will post the first chapter next week. Or this week, I'm really excited so it may be sooner than next weekend. 
> 
> Happy reading. Thank you all for following my stories, I am so grateful. Your kudos and comments are welcome and so, so, so, appreciated! 
> 
> Please check out my tumblr if you're interested in sending any prompts my way.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi friends! Welcome to another series. This one will be multi-chapter, at least three parts and deal primarily with Wanda Maximoff as she struggles to find her place in a world she doesn't believe she belong to. 
> 
> Please let me know what you think. I hope everyone on the east coast on the U.S. are staying cozy and warm among the snow. My walk this morning left Watson and I completely frozen over. That justifies snuggling on the couch, right? <3


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